Dying
by The needy stranger
Summary: One shot set at the very beginning of the series. Shinji is attacked at the train station while waiting for Misato to pick him up. Does Shinji have the strength to survive this?


DISCLAIMER: Alright, we've been through this before, I own none of the characters portrayed in this fic. If anyone gets the idea to sue me, I will gladly give them the moths that are the sole occupants of my wallet at the moment. 

Dying. A Neon Genesis Evangelion fan fiction by Richard Abraham

It's hard to concentrate, to focus on my hand and at the sight of the blood seeping out from under it and between my fingers.

I have to focus.

Focus beyond the pain and think of something. It's so hard though. My mind can't seem to concentrate on anything other than the pain from the wound in my stomach.

Focus!

There's a phone on the wall only a few feet away. If I can get to it, I'll be able to phone for an ambulance.

A memory of a voice announcing an emergency situation in the region pops into my mind. I find it morbidly amusing given I'm now in a very personal and dire emergency of my own. My amusement is obliterated however, when a slight shift in my position results in an explosion of pain radiating from the wound in my gut and racking my entire torso. As bad as the pain was before, I'm actually praying for it to return now.

This isn't good. If even small movements result in such pain, how will I ever make it to the phone booth? Never mind dragging myself into a standing position so I can actually use it.

At the moment, I'm in the same position where I fell after the attack. Thankfully, the station wall is to my back, providing some support, and hopefully some leverage when I start what promises to be a long journey to the phone.

Maybe, just maybe, I can inch myself along the wall in the sitting position I managed to maintain after the attack. I know it's going to be a very painful journey, but seeing as the alternative is certain death, I'll have to find it within myself to overcome it. This is definitely something I can't run away from, not if I want to know what my father wants with me after so long.

Thoughts of my father bring forth a wave of depressing images. It was a train station somewhat similar to this one where he left me all those years ago. Wait! I can't let these memories intrude just now; they'll only bog me down in my own depression.

Just think about getting to that phone. That's all there is in this world at the moment.

Summoning from previously untapped reserves, I slowly bend my knees to place my feet flat against the ground. I stretch my right hand out, looking for anything to use as a handhold. Finding the edge of one of the bricks, I clutch desperately to it as I push my feet at an angle to slide myself along the wall.

The pain is unbearable and I have to stop after only a couple of inches. I can feel despair welling up inside me, and the tears in my eyes aren't solely from the lancing pain in my stomach.

How can I do this? If every inch is going to be this painful, is it even possible? I start sobbing as the situation truly crashes in on me and the shaking of my torso as I sob only sends more pain searing through my body. I'm going to die here, stabbed for no reason and bleeding to death in an abandoned station with no hope of rescue.

I'm going to die as I lived, abandoned and alone.

I know I shouldn't be sitting here wallowing in my own grief. I know that every second I spend here is one second closer to death. I know this, but it's just too much. I can't do this; I'm not strong enough.

I look over to the payphone, only now I see it in a different light. It's taunting me. It feels almost malicious as it sits there so close and yet so completely unreachable, goading me in my defeat. And gradually, despair is replaced with hate. I hate that phone. I hate it for bringing hope to a hopeless situation. I hate it for being so out of my reach.

I'm not going to let that dammed thing win. If only to prove to myself that I'm better than a thing. That I'm not worthless.

Again, I reach out for the wall and find purchase. Again I brace my feet in preparation for another push.

Again the pain is incredible and the only thing that's keeping me from screaming my pain is the fact that the agony has stolen the breath from my lungs. I can't see how much progress I made with that push as I'm currently blinded by tears of pain and I don't think I can spare the energy to wipe them away.

I can't stop now. If I do, I'll not be able to start up again. And so, I brace my feet again and push, desperately trying to avoid thinking about the pain. Of course, that proves impossible, as my entire existence seems to be focussed around my pain. It doesn't matter though, as I'm still making progress, inch by tortuous inch.

Hope starts to rise within the ocean of pain when I hit the two-thirds mark in my journey. Another foot, give or take a few inches, and then I could worry about how I was going to raise myself high enough to operate the phone. I'm deliberately avoiding thinking about that problem at the moment, as I know the last thing I need is another reason for despair. It proves to be easy to avoid thinking about, I suppose near crippling pain can do that to you.

It is at this point that my trek is brutally interrupted by an explosion in the distance that Ican hear even above the roaring in my ears from the blood pounding in my head.

I look blindly to where the explosion seemed to come from and blink the tears from my eyes as I try to focus both my eyes and my mind. I wonder if I should worry that my vision is dimming around the edges.

Oh good Lord, what... what IS that thing? It's huge. Even at this distance, I can feel the tremors as it's massive, er... feet, pound the tortured earth beneath it.

My eyes don't seem to be focussing properly at the moment, and the darkness at the edge of my vision seems to be creeping inward gleefully. Despite this, I can still see the creature shoot a glowing orange rod from its hand, obliterating one of the completely ineffective aircraft that was swarming around it.

I know I shouldn't be sitting here idly watching this. I should resume my trek to the phone. However, I don't think I can do it anymore. The phone is so far away and I'm so cold and the numbness that had introduced itself to my extremities a few minutes ago now seems to be reaching for my heart. The darkness that had been swimming about the edges of my vision has almost swallowed up my entire view and the entire world is dimmer.

I hear a car screeching to a halt a million miles away though I don't really care anymore. All I know is that the darkness is promising me peace, and respite from my pain. I can barely feel the wound anymore as I'm so numb, so I guess it's living up to it's promise.

This is it. I'm really going to die now, and yet, I'm not afraid anymore. It's not as if I had that much to live for really. At best, I suppose I was existing. That's not really the same as living though is it?

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Misato Katsuragi stared in horror at what lay before her.

It was pretty obvious that this boy had literally just died, as he was still warm to the touch. With a sick sense of realisation, she knew that she could have prevented this if she had just kept her promise and got here at the time she herself had set.

Not wanting to leave the boy's corpse out in the open, despite the approaching threat, she struggled to heft the leaden weight over her shoulder and put him in the back of her car.

This boy's death was going to have dire repercussions, not just for her personally or for NERV, but possibly for the entire human race. And yet, what Misato would remember for the rest of her days, despite Shinji's violent end, was the expression of peaceful acceptance that marked his final passing from this world.

-Fin-

Author's notes

First off, I'd like to BEG all you good readers out there for your opinions on this piece.

Even if you didn't like it, but have some suggestions on my writing style, I'm willing to hear them. People don't understand that writers live for reviews of their work, they motivate us to try harder and write more. If you think it's just average, tell me what it's lacking, is it my writing style? Are my ideas cliched? Are the characters too out of character?

Secondly, I suppose I should apologise for taking a year to start writing again (not that I have any fans that were grieving over my absence though). I promise I'll try harder in the future. I've kinda run out of ideas for eva fics though at the moment, but I've got ideas for other anime.

I've updated my bio with my current projects and the ideas I have for new fics. If you have any preferences on what I should be spending the most time on, give me a mail, I guarantee it'll motivate me to work harder.

Okay, so about this fic. I got the idea from a short story I read in my early high school years. It's about a teenager who was in a gang, stabbed by rival gang members and left to die in a dark and deserted back alley. The story was told in his point of view for the majority, with him trying to call for help and failing because of the pain. It dealt with his thoughts and emotions until the end where it switched to third person omniscient for when his girlfriend was talking to the police at the scene.

I changed quite a few things in this fic, but I wanted to tell it in roughly the same style (though it's been years since I read the story).

I used the payphone that represented Shinji's hope of survival as a motivator, I hope you all appreciate the irony of it.

For those of you who didn't get it. Shinji's sole motivator during the fic was to get to the phone, he endured unimaginable pain to get to it. Yet not only did he fail to get there, the phone lines were all down due to the state of emergency in the region, so even if he had made it, he wouldn't have been able to do anything . So it was a futile quest from the beginning. It was one of the reasons I gave the phone dark human qualities, to put across the sheer futility of Shinji's hope.

Anyway, I hope you all can forgive this dark piece of fan fiction (and the HUGE author's notes), and I promise that the next eva fic I write will be all fluff and happiness... heh, suuuuuure. :)

Needystranger.


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